Does Parental Education Affect Fertility? Evidence from Pre-Demographic Transition Prussia

38 Pages Posted: 4 May 2011

See all articles by Sascha O. Becker

Sascha O. Becker

Monash University - Department of Economics; University of Warwick

Francesco Cinnirella

University of Bergamo; University of Southern Denmark - Department of Business and Economics; CESifo (Center for Economic Studies and Ifo Institute) - Ifo Institute; Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR); CAGE

Ludger Woessmann

Ifo Institute for Economic Research; Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA); CESifo (Center for Economic Studies and Ifo Institute for Economic Research); University of Munich - Ifo Institute for Economic Research

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Date Written: April 29, 2011

Abstract

While women’s employment opportunities, relative wages, and the child quantity‐quality trade‐off have been studied as factors underlying historical fertility limitation, the role of parental education has received little attention. We combine Prussian county data from three censuses - 1816, 1849, and 1867 - to estimate the relationship between women’s education and their fertility before the demographic transition. Despite controlling for several demand and supply factors, we find a negative residual effect of women’s education on fertility. Instrumental‐variable estimates, using exogenous variation in women’s education driven by differences in landownership inequality, suggest that the effect of women’s education on fertility is causal.

Keywords: demographic transition, female education, fertility, nineteenth century Prussia

JEL Classification: N330, J130, J240

Suggested Citation

Becker, Sascha O. and Cinnirella, Francesco and Woessmann, Ludger, Does Parental Education Affect Fertility? Evidence from Pre-Demographic Transition Prussia (April 29, 2011). CESifo Working Paper Series No. 3430, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1831121 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1831121

Sascha O. Becker

Monash University - Department of Economics ( email )

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University of Warwick ( email )

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Francesco Cinnirella (Contact Author)

University of Bergamo ( email )

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University of Southern Denmark - Department of Business and Economics ( email )

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Denmark

CESifo (Center for Economic Studies and Ifo Institute) - Ifo Institute ( email )

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Ludger Woessmann

Ifo Institute for Economic Research ( email )

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Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA)

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